No TV show better encapsulates the nexus between money and power than Industry. The HBO drama sees investment bankers screwing, snorting and slogging their way to the top of English society. Now, in its fourth series, political intrigue is taking centre stage. Think House of Cards – but with more sex and better-remunerated hotties.

Mickey Down and Konrad Kay, the co-writers of the show, explain when we chat that they wanted to ‘expand the canvas’ as Industry progressed. It initially focused on the ‘hermetically sealed’ world of the trading floor but has now expanded beyond. ‘Finance is linked to other spheres of influence,’ says Down. ‘Obviously finance and media have a transactional relationship. Finance and politics also have a transactional relationship. So we just moved towards politics.’ Series three dwelt heavily on the green finance rush and the Tory mini-Budget; the latest series focuses on fintech, online platforms and the new Labour government.

‘When a belief system comes into contact with an incentive structure, what do you do?’

In the fast-paced world of politics and banking, today’s enthusiasms become yesterday’s fads. Down and Kay try to avoid focusing on day-to-day minutiae for a more thematic approach which speaks to broader truths. This avoids making the show feel dated, explains Kay. A current plotline involves Labour ministers struggling to reconcile their political values with the need to support a controversial new start-up so as to appear ‘pro-business’. Down recalls how, when they were writing the series, ‘there were all these reports about Rachel Reeves and Revolut and, you know, [a] slightly less than appropriate relationship between her and the top dogs there’.

In Industry, characters constantly compromise their political beliefs. ‘When a belief system comes into contact with an incentive structure, what do you do?’ asks Down. ‘How important are your beliefs really?’ For Kay, ‘people on the left and right in the show [are] being subjected to a lot of the same forces… it doesn’t really have much to do with ideology.’

Industry’s business minister, Jenny Bevan, is ambitious, northern and staunchly Labour, in a similar mould to Bridget Phillipson. Which real-life MPs have the pair met? ‘Rishi Sunak said he was going to watch it,’ says Kay. One of the main characters is named Rishi, although it’s fair to say his career in the City is rather more chequered than his namesake’s. ‘[Sunak] came back and said he’s seen all of it,’ adds Down.

Down and Kay list the Tory leaders they have met: Sunak, Liz Truss and Boris Johnson. ‘You’ve met [Ed] Miliband,’ says Kay. ‘Yeah, yeah,’ replies Down. ‘But yeah, unfortunately he wasn’t the prime minister. Maybe, maybe in a few weeks.’

‘I’d like to speak to some more politicians,’ says Down, but suggests they might be ‘reticent’ to talk ‘because they know what they say is going to end up on the show’.

Another fictitious Industry politician is Sebastian Stefanowicz, the blunt-speaking, chiselled-jaw Reform MP. In the show he sits for South Thanet, the seat that Nigel Farage failed to win in 2015. Kay suggests that Stefanowicz ‘is our sort of Farage…’. ‘But a bit sexier!’ adds Down. ‘Sexier, definitely sexier,’ continues Kay, ‘100 per cent sexier… The terrifying thing is, I bet there are loads of women who find Farage sexy.’

What does the City make of Farage’s party? ‘Anecdotally, from the people I speak to about it, there’s still a skittishness about Reform. People don’t really understand what they stand for,’ says Down. ‘Hedge-fund managers want as much certainty as they possibly can… maybe give it a year. I’m sure a lot of hedge-fund money is going towards Reform.’

There is much tension between the old City and the new in Industry: a world where Englishness, school ties and ‘proper fucking lunches’ are vanishing, displaced by globalism, algorithms and AI. In one scene, an ageing banker talks fondly of ‘Boisdale, 5 Hertford and Annabel’s’, three institutions beloved by members of Farage’s circle.

Given the rise of the right, what of the pair’s own viewing habits? Is Down a keen GB News man? ‘God, no!’ he exclaims, before checking himself. ‘I watch GB News as much as I watch Novara. I try to see what everyone’s thinking. X is an absolute cesspit, but it’s actually quite good for seeing the extremes of people’s political opinions.’ He admits he is ‘probably a little bit too online’ and is currently obsessed with Rupert Lowe’s new party Restore Britain. ‘I’ve been fascinated by all this… I am trying to work out whether it is just online fervour or whether it is actually something that the average person is interested in.’

Crucially, the pair are big Spectator fans. The show is sprinkled with nods to this magazine: in our half-hour chat, we cover Coffee House Shots, Douglas Murray’s column and a mooted Martin Vander Weyer cameo. Our annual summer party is the ultimate indictment of Westminster, suggests Down: ‘Journalists and politicians, lawmakers, civil servants, lobbyists – they’re all in there having their Pol Roger and scratching each other’s backs, deciding how the country is going to be run… and no canapés [in sight].’ It would be remiss of me not to note, too, that Down and Kay have also been spotted at it.

The garrulous pair are reticent about whether they will get a potential fifth and final series. ‘We can’t talk about it really,’ says Down. ‘It’s a little bit of a – it’s a black box at the moment.’ But they are clearly keen to keep world-building. They know how to appeal to both Westminster diehards and the general public. ‘Political wonks and nerds like you, James, obviously like the politics of it and probably can leave the sex and drugs,’ says Down.

He ends the interview by dangling the kind of tempting offer that is the hallmark of Industry plotlines. ‘Maybe talk offline,’ he says. ‘If we were to go for a fifth season and we need a political journalist playing himself – we love a weird cameo in this show.’ Sign me up.